I was in the process of cleaning up my craft room when my boys saw the pattern for McCalls 6136 in my pattern notebook. They were immediately in love with the giraffes on the envelope and wanted me to make some for them.
I’ve made a giraffe from this pattern before, so I had all of the pieces cut out and knew it wouldn’t take long. Plus, I’m a sucker. So I agreed and they picked out some quilting cotton from my much-too-large fabric stash.
They decided they didn’t want to have yarn added for the tail or mane (I think they were too impatient to get their animals!), but they love the finished products!
The pattern is fairly quick and easy to make, though I’m always surprised at how many little pieces it takes (6 pattern pieces).
The giraffes are not big (even though this is labeled as the large giraffe). I can’t imagine putting together the littler one. The finished giraffe is 14.5 inches tall.
But they are pretty cute – and my boys always love being able to pick out their own fabrics and seeing something come together the way they imagined it. They also loved helping to stuff the giraffes – though it was a little tricky for the 5 year olds to get enough stuffing in the little legs and up to the head, so I had to assist a little.
The boys insisted on picking out mismatched buttons for the eyes (and one boy loved the idea of picking out two different fabrics to incorporate together – perhaps just to make the project a little more difficult… :)).
I made this same pattern years ago for a gift for my cousin’s child, which made putting this pattern together this time even easier.
Overall, it’s a fairly quick project, despite the small pieces, and the finished giraffe is pretty cute!